Last night was the premiere episode of my new favorite show ever — “Hoarders” on A&E. Similar to “Intervention” and “Obsessed,” “Hoarders” followed two stories of people with this OCD-related disease. Jennifer and Ron are both hoarders whose messy (ha!) ways are greatly impacting the home they have set up for their three children. Laundry, trash, and junk pack every inch of their house, causing the family to have to eat all of their meals in bed because there is nowhere to sit down or put their plates. But this couples pales in comparison to Jill, a Milwaukee woman who hoards everything and the kitchen sink, but primarily focuses her obsession on food. She’s got four refrigerators packed to the gills with spoiled, expired meat and dairy products, a pantry stocked with more couscous than your local grocery store, and, beneath all the other trash, rotting pumpkins and fruit everywhere.
It’s clear Jill suffers from a real mental illness and her recovery will be tough, but I couldn’t help but giggle at the enthusiasm the woman clearly has for food. “It was a very nice pumpkin when it was fresh,” she explains to the hoarding specialist, in reference to a barely recognizable squash. “The eggs were too pretty to eat!” she tells her sister about a container of eggs gifted to her TWO YEARS AGO. “Ohhhh! I didn’t know I had tamales!” she exclaims, after discovering a package of frozen tamales in the back of her freezer, behind a wall of disintegrating and rotting meat. Warning, this show might kill your appetite. Clip above. [A&E: Hoarders]
